With the increasing prevalence of computing devices, many methods have been developed to enable a computing device to be used to fund an electronic payment transaction. Originally, a user could manually input payment details into their computing device, which would be transmitted for processing in the payment transaction, such as via a web page or other similar application program. As technology became more advanced, electronic wallets were developed, which were specialized application programs that utilized more secure methods of storage to store payment credentials, which could be electronically transmitted to a merchant point of sale through a network (e.g., the Internet) or even directly, such as via near field communication for an in-purchase transaction. Traditionally, electronic wallets have operated by storing all of the same data that would be stored in a payment card and conveying it to a point of sale, where the point of sale receives the same data that it would if reading the payment card directly, effectively trading a payment card for a mobile device that acts as a payment card.
In more recent times, some entities have developed their own kinds of electronic wallets that use alternative methods to pay for payment transactions. In such wallets, the wallet may generate unique data that is provided to the merchant, where the merchant routes that data back to the wallet provider or an associated financial institution that can identify a related account to be used to fund the transaction. Such methods provide for greater security than standard electronic wallets, as the unique data may be usable for only a single transaction, and may only be processed through merchants that are configured to receive and use such data. One common type of unique data is a one-time number.
However, the processing of one-time numbers and other unique data requires that the merchant be specially configured to receive and process such data, and that the merchant have a connection to the wallet provider or an associated financial institution. As a result, any new merchant that wants to accept that electronic wallet for payment must procure hardware and software and communication infrastructure specific to that electronic wallet. For many merchants, particularly small businesses, the resource expenditure may greatly outweigh the benefits provided in accepting such payment. In addition, expansion of the electronic wallet to additional markets may be a difficult, expensive, and time-consuming project.
Thus, there is a need for a technical solution where one-time numbers and other types of unique data generated by an electronic wallet can be processed using payment rails associated with a payment network to take advantage of existing electronic payment transaction processing and infrastructure.